Young men today appear to be experiencing a sharp increase in ED (and other sexual dysfunctions) since the advent of streaming internet. All studies assessing young male sexuality since 2010 report historic levels of erectile dysfunction, and startling rates of a new scourge: low libido.

Erectile dysfunction rates ranged from 14 to 33%, while rates for low libido (hypo-sexuality) ranged from 16% to 37%. The lower ranges are taken from studies involving teens and men 25 and under, while the higher ranges are from studies involving men 40 and under. One of the most dramatic examples of how younger men are suffering higher rates of ED is from a research survey of male adult film actors published in 2018. the IIEF is the standard urology test for erectile function.

These high rates are a recent phenomenon, but comparing ED rates in men over time can be challenging. Traditionally, ED rates have been negligible in young men, and did not begin to rise sharply until after age 40. For example, here’s a graph from a Dutch study comparing data from prior to 2004.

The next challenge is to understand the extent to which ED rates have risen. This is thorny because ED rates have been measured using various different instruments in the last 25 years. Some researchers asked a single (yes/no) question and requested those with ED to rate its severity. Others use a 5- or 6-question version of a more recent instrument that employs Likert scales. It’s called the IIEF (The International Index of Erectile Function), and is used widely today. Still other researchers used different questionnaires.

GSSAB ED results over time

We’ll discuss a number of study results that show the upward trend, but let’s start with some of the most irrefutable research. It demonstrates a radical rise in ED rates over a decade using very large samples (which increase reliability). All the men were assessed using the same (yes/no) question about ED, as part of the Global Study of Sexual Attitudes and Behavior (GSSAB), administered to 13,618 sexually active men in 29 countries. That occurred in 2001-2002. A decade later, in 2011, the same “sexual difficulties” (yes/no) question from the GSSAB was administered to 2,737 sexually active men in Croatia, Norway and Portugal. The first group, in 2001-2002, were aged 40-80. The second group, in 2011, were 40 and under.

Based on the findings of prior studies one would predict the older men would have far higher ED scores than the younger men, whose scores should have been negligible. Not so. In just a decade, things had changed radically. The 2001-2002 ED rates for men 40-80 were about 13% in Europe. By 2011, ED rates in young Europeans, 18-40, ranged from 14-28%!

What changed in men’s sexual environment during this time? Well, major changes were internet penetration and access to porn videos (followed by access to streaming porn in 2006, and then smartphones on which to view it). In the 2011 study on Croatians, Norwegians and Portuguese, the Portuguese had the lowest rates of ED and the Norwegians had the highest. In 2013, internet penetration rates in Portugal were only 67%, compared with 95% in Norway.

Historical ED rates

What about other historical rates of ED in peer-reviewed literature using various instruments? First, here are results from the 2 major cross-sectional studies on ED in sexually active American men. Both predated heavy internet penetration.

In the 1940s, the Kinsey report concluded that the prevalence of ED was less than 1% in men younger than 30 years, less than 3% in those 30–45.

A 1999 cross-sectional study (based on data gathered in 1992) published by the Journal of the American Medical Association reported erectile dysfunction rates of only 5%, and low sexual desire in 5%. In that study, the ages of the men surveyed ranged from 18 to 59, so a third of them were over 40, which means the rates for sexually active men under 40 were lower.

In 2002 Dutch researchers did a meta-analysis of 6 high-quality ED studies. All of the studies reviewed from Europe (5) reported ED rates for men under 40 of approximately 2%. The sixth was the one reported immediately above.

Note: Keep in mind that ED rates for all men in every age group are higher than rates for sexually active men. For example, in the 1992 data for sexually active men 18-59, the average ED rate was only 5%. However, the rates for men (both sexually active and not) were 7% in men 18-29, 9% in men 30-39, 11% in men 40-49, and 18% in men 50-59. In order to compare “apples to apples,” we, like most researchers, focus on rates for sexually active men. This unfortunately fails to count ED problems in young men who avoid sex due to porn-induced sexual dysfunctions.

Before we turn back to recent studies, it’s important to understand a bit more about the pathology of erectile dysfunction. ED is usually classified as either psychogenic or organic. Traditionally, psychogenic ED is associated with psychological factors (e.g., depression, stress, or anxiety) while organic ED is attributed to physical conditions (e.g., neurological, hormonal, or anatomical.) The most common diagnosis for guys under 40 is psychogenic ED.

Studies investigating ED risk factors in men under 40 typically fail to find the causes commonly associated with ED in older men, such as smoking, alcoholism, obesity, sedentary life, diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and hyperlipidemia. Be very skeptical if you read that the preceding causes of organic ED in older men are also the cause of a sharp rise in youthful ED. It takes years for various lifestyle factors to manifest as vasculogenic or neurogenic ED.

Recent studies on young men

Now, we turn to other recent studies on young men (~40 and under). Using the IIEF-5, a 2012 cross-sectional study of Swiss men aged 18-24 found ED rates of 30%, and a 2010 Brazilian study of men 18-40 reported ED rates of 35%. A 2013 Italian study reported one in four patients seeking help for new onset ED were younger than 40. Astonishingly, the rate of severe ED was nearly 10% higher in younger men than in men over 40. The University of Florence urology clinic reported that first time ED patients under 40 comprised about 5% of the total patient population. By 2014-2015 men under 40 seeking help for ED comprised 15% of first time patients. Also, a 2015 paper about 4,211 Italians who sought outpatient help for sexual dysfunction found that compulsive masturbators were younger than the other men and had higher rates of ED (and were likely masturbating to internet porn).

A 2014 study of new diagnoses of ED in active duty servicemen reported that rates had more than doubled between 2004 and 2013. Rates of psychogenic ED increased more than organic ED, and rates of unclassified ED remained relatively stable. A 2014 cross-sectional study of active duty, relatively healthy, male military personnel aged 21-40 found an overall ED rate of 33.2%, using the IIEF-5. About half of them also had PTSD (a known risk factor for ED). In a further military study published in 2015, the researchers found that ED was associated with sexual anxiety and genital self-image, both of which could easily be tied to heavy internet porn use.

The next studies reveal that abnormally low sexual desire is also cropping up in young men.

1) A 2014 study on Canadian adolescents reported that 53.5% of males aged 16-21 have symptoms indicative of a sexual problem. Erectile dysfunction was the most common (27%), followed by low sexual desire (24%), and problems with orgasm (11%). The authors were baffled why rates were so high, and were surprised that sexual dysfunction rates for males surpassed females, unlike in earlier published literature.

2) The same Canadian researchers published a 2-year longitudinal study in 2016, in which they found that, over several checkpoints during the 2 years, the following percentages of 16-21 year old males reported:

low sexual satisfaction (47.9%)

low desire (46.2%)

problems in erectile function (45.3%)

While females’ sexual problems improved over time the males’ sexual problems did not: “Unlike for male adolescents, we found a clearer picture of improvement over time for female adolescents, suggesting that learning and experience played a role in improving their sexual lives.” And, “The only factor that emerged as a strong predictor was relationship status: Adolescents who were not in a sexual relationship were approximately three times more likely to report a problem in sexual functioning compared to those who were in a sexual relationship.” [All subjects were sexually active, but who would be using the most porn?]

3) A 2015 study on Italian high school seniors (18-19) found that 16% of those who use porn more than once per week reported abnormally low sexual desire. Non-porn users reported 0% low sexual desire.

A 2015 study, which asked Canadian men using porn 7 or more hours per week about their sexual functioning, found that 71% had sexual dysfunctions, with 33% reporting difficulty orgasming. Average age 41.5.

Together, these studies suggest a recent increase in ED in men ~40 and under, as well as startling rates of anorgasmia and low sexual desire, starting quite young (as does internet porn use).

None of these studies had young men remove porn use to investigate internet porn’s effects on their sexual performance, despite the fact that its use represents a drastic change in men’s sexual environment in the digital age. However, the peer-reviewed evidence supporting internet porn as the culprit in youthful sexual dysfunction continues to accumulate. See this list of 19 studies linking porn use or porn addiction to sexual dysfunctions and lower arousal to sexual stimuli. The first 3 studies in this list demonstrate causation as participants eliminated porn use and healed chronic sexual dysfunctions.

In line with anecdotal evidence and peer-reviewed research

The image to the right appeared in an analysis of ED posts from MedHelp forums. “Nearly 60% of men posting on the forums were under 24 years old. This was a surprising finding for researchers, as erectile dysfunction is generally considered a condition that strikes older men.”

An Irish Times poll asked thousands of readers about ED, and the number of men 24-34 with issues was 28%:

Click on graphics from 2015 Irish Times poll to see ED rates, which show higher rates in young men than in men 35-49!

Hundreds of self-reports of recovery from ED and other sexual dysfunctions after quitting internet porn can be found on these pages:

Already, a handful of studies have correlated use of internet porn and porn addiction with arousal, attraction, and sexual performance problems. Results link its use with diminished libido or erectile function, delayed ejaculation, a preference for using porn to achieve and maintain arousal over having sex with a partner, negative effects on partnered sex, decreased enjoyment of sexual intimacy, and lower brain activation to sexual images.

The first 3 studies demonstrate causation as participants eliminated porn use and healed chronic sexual dysfunctions:

1) Is Internet Pornography Causing Sexual Dysfunctions? A Review with Clinical Reports (2016) – An extensive review of the literature related to porn-induced sexual problems. Involving US Navy doctors, the review provides the latest data revealing a tremendous rise in youthful sexual problems. It also reviews the neurological studies related to porn addiction and sexual conditioning via Internet porn. The doctors provide 3 clinical reports of men who developed porn-induced sexual dysfunctions. Two of the three men healed their sexual dysfunctions by eliminating porn use. The third man experienced little improvement as he was unable to abstain from porn use. Excerpt:

Traditional factors that once explained men’s sexual difficulties appear insufficient to account for the sharp rise in erectile dysfunction, delayed ejaculation, decreased sexual satisfaction, and diminished libido during partnered sex in men under 40. This review (1) considers data from multiple domains, e.g., clinical, biological (addiction/urology), psychological (sexual conditioning), sociological; and (2) presents a series of clinical reports, all with the aim of proposing a possible direction for future research of this phenomenon. Alterations to the brain’s motivational system are explored as a possible etiology underlying pornography-related sexual dysfunctions. This review also considers evidence that Internet pornography’s unique properties (limitless novelty, potential for easy escalation to more extreme material, video format, etc.) may be potent enough to condition sexual arousal to aspects of Internet pornography use that do not readily transition to real-life partners, such that sex with desired partners may not register as meeting expectations and arousal declines. Clinical reports suggest that terminating Internet pornography use is sometimes sufficient to reverse negative effects, underscoring the need for extensive investigation using methodologies that have subjects remove the variable of Internet pornography use.

2)Male masturbation habits and sexual dysfunctions (2016) – It’s by a French psychiatrist who is the current president of the European Federation of Sexology. While the abstract shifts back and forth between Internet pornography use and masturbation, it’s clear that he’s mostly referring to porn-induced sexual dysfunctions (erectile dysfunction and anorgasmia). The paper revolves around his clinical experience with 35 men who developed erectile dysfunction and/or anorgasmia, and his therapeutic approaches to help them. The author states that most of his patients used porn, with several being addicted to porn. The abstract point to internet porn as the primary cause of the problems (keep in mind that masturbation does not cause chronic ED, and it is never given as a cause of ED). Excerpts:

Intro: Harmless and even helpful in his usual form widely practiced, masturbation in its excessive and pre-eminent form, generally associated today to pornographic addiction, is too often overlooked in the clinical assessment of sexual dysfunction it can induce.

Results: Initial results for these patients, after treatment to “unlearn” their masturbatory habits and their often associated addiction to pornography, are encouraging and promising. A reduction in symptoms was obtained in 19 patients out of 35. The dysfunctions regressed and these patients were able to enjoy satisfactory sexual activity.

Conclusion: Addictive masturbation, often accompanied by a dependency on cyber-pornography, has been seen to play a role in the etiology of certain types of erectile dysfunction or coital anejaculation. It is important to systematically identify the presence of these habits rather than conduct a diagnosis by elimination, in order to include habit-breaking deconditioning techniques in managing these dysfunctions

“When asked about masturbatory practices, he reported that in the past he had been masturbating vigorously and rapidly while watching pornography since adolescence. The pornography originally consisted mainly of zoophilia, and bondage, domination, sadism, and masochism, but he eventually got habituated to these materials and needed more hardcore pornography scenes, including transgender sex, orgies, and violent sex. He used to buy illegal pornographic movies on violent sex acts and rape and visualized those scenes in his imagination to function sexually with women. He gradually lost his desire and his ability to fantasize and decreased his masturbation frequency.”

In conjunction with weekly sessions with a sex therapist, the patient was instructed to avoid any exposure to sexually explicit material, including videos, newspapers, books, and internet pornography.

After 8 months, the patient reported experiencing successful orgasm and ejaculation. He renewed his relationship with that woman, and they gradually succeeded in enjoying good sexual practices.

“related to high levels of exposure to and experience with sexually explicit materials.“

The men experiencing erectile dysfunction had spent a considerable amount of time in bars and bathhouses where porn was “omnipresent,” and “continuously playing“. The researchers stated:

“Conversations with the subjects reinforced our idea that in some of them a high exposure to erotica seemed to have resulted in a lower responsivity to “vanilla sex” erotica and an increased need for novelty and variation, in some cases combined with a need for very specific types of stimuli in order to get aroused.”

5)Neural Correlates of Sexual Cue Reactivity in Individuals with and without Compulsive Sexual Behaviours (2014) – This fMRI study by Cambridge University found cue-reactivity in porn addicts which mirrored sensitization in drug addicts. It also found that porn addicts (CSB) fit the accepted addiction model of wanting “it” more, but not liking “it” more. The researchers also reported that 60% of subjects (average age: 25) had difficulty achieving erections/arousal with real partners as a result of using porn, yet could achieve erections with porn. From the study (CSB is compulsive sexual behaviours – or porn addicts):

“CSB subjects reported that as a result of excessive use of sexually explicit materials….. experienced diminished libido or erectile function specifically in physical relationships with women (although not in relationship to the sexually explicit material)”

“Compared to healthy volunteers, CSB subjects had greater subjective sexual desire or wanting to explicit cues and had greater liking scores to erotic cues, thus demonstrating a dissociation between wanting and liking. CSB subjects also had greater impairments of sexual arousal and erectile difficulties in intimate relationships but not with sexually explicit materials highlighting that the enhanced desire scores were specific to the explicit cues and not generalized heightened sexual desire.“

“This study is the first to directly investigate the relationships between sexual dysfunctions and problematic involvement in OSAs. Results indicated that higher sexual desire, lower overall sexual satisfaction, and lower erectile function were associated with problematic OSAs (online sexual activities). These results can be linked to those of previous studies reporting a high level of arousability in association with sexual addiction symptoms (Bancroft & Vukadinovic, 2004; Laier et al., 2013; Muise et al., 2013).”

In addition, we finally have a study that asks porn users about possible escalation to new or disturbing porn genres. Guess what it found?

“Forty-nine percent mentioned at least sometimes searching for sexual content or being involved in OSAs that were not previously interesting to them or that they considered disgusting, and 61.7% reported that at least sometimes OSAs were associated with shame or guilty feelings.”

Note – This is the first study to directly investigate the relationships between sexual dysfunctions and problematic porn use. Two other studies claiming to have investigated correlations between porn use and erectile functioning cobbled together data from earlier studies in an unsuccessful attempt to debunk porn-induced ED. Both were criticized in the peer-reviewed literature: paper 1 was not an authentic study, and has been thoroughly discredited; paper 2 actually found correlations that support porn-induced ED. Moreover, paper 2 was only a “brief communication” that did not report important data.

7)Adolescents and web porn: a new era of sexuality (2015) – An Italian study analyzed the effects of Internet porn on high school students, co-authored by urology professor Carlo Foresta, president of the Italian Society of Reproductive Pathophysiology. The most interesting finding is that 16% of those who consume porn more than once a week report abnormally low sexual desire compared with 0% in non-consumers (and 6% for those who consume less than once a week). From the study, concerning pornography use:

21.9% define it as habitual, 10% report that it reduces sexual interest towards potential real-life partners, and the remaining, 9.1% report a kind of addiction. In addition, 19% of overall pornography consumers report an abnormal sexual response, while the percentage rose to 25.1% among regular consumers.

8) Patient Characteristics by Type of Hypersexuality Referral: A Quantitative Chart Review of 115 Consecutive Male Cases (2015)– Study on men (average age 41.5) with hypersexuality disorders, such as paraphilias and chronic masturbation or adultery. 27 were classified as “avoidant masturbators,” meaning they masturbated (typically with porn use) one or more hours per day or more than 7 hours per week. 71% reported sexual functioning problems, with 33% reporting delayed ejaculation (a precursor to porn-induced ED). What sexual dysfunction do 38% of the remaining men have? The study doesn’t say, and the authors have ignored requests for details. Two primary choices for male sexual dysfunction are ED and low libido. The men were not asked about their erectile functioning without porn. If all their sexual activity involved masturbating to porn, and not sex with a partner, they would never realize they had porn-induced ED.

9) The effects of sexually explicit material use on romantic relationship dynamics (2016) – As with many other studies, solitary porn users report poorer relationship and sexual satisfaction. Employing the Pornography Consumption Effect Scale (PCES), the study found that higher porn use was related to poorer sexual function, more sexual problems, and a “worse sex life”. An excerpt describing the correlation between the PCES “Negative Effects” on “Sex Life” questions and frequency of porn use:

There were no significant differences for the Negative Effect Dimension PCES across the frequency of sexually explicit material use; however, there were significant differences on the Sex Life subscale where High Frequency Porn Users reported greater negative effects than Low Frequency Porn Users.

“We assume that subjects with a high porn consumption need increasing stimulation to receive the same amount of reward. That could mean that regular consumption of pornography more or less wears out your reward system. That would fit perfectly the hypothesis that their reward systems need growing stimulation.”

“The more hours participants reported consuming pornography, the smaller the BOLD response in left putamen in response to sexual images. Moreover, we found that more hours spent watching pornography was associated with smaller gray matter volume in the striatum, more precisely in the right caudate reaching into the ventral putamen. We speculate that the brain structural volume deficit may reflect the results of tolerance after desensitization to sexual stimuli.”

13) Modulation of Late Positive Potentials by Sexual Images in Problem Users and Controls Inconsistent with “Porn Addiction” (2015) – Another SPAN Lab EEG study comparing the 2013 subjects from the above study to an actual control group. The results: compared to controls “compulsive porn users” had less response to photos of vanilla porn. Ignoring all the other studies on this page, lead author Nicole Prause, boldly claims that her results “debunked porn addiction”. What legitimate scientist would claim that their lone anomalous study has debunked an entire field of study? In reality, the findings of Prause et al. 2015 align perfectly with Kühn & Gallinat (2014), which found that more porn use correlated with less brain activation in response to pictures of vanilla porn. Prause’s findings also align with Banca et al. 2015 which is #4 in this list. Moreover, another EEG study found that greater porn use in women correlated with less brain activation to porn. Lower EEG readings mean that subjects are paying less attention to the pictures. Put simply, frequent porn users were desensitized to static images of vanilla porn. They were bored. Read an extensive critique here. Six peer-reviewed papers have stated that this study actually found desensitization or habituation in frequent porn users – 1, 2, 3,4,5, 6.

“Among men who masturbated frequently, 70% used pornography at least once a week. A multivariate assessment showed that sexual boredom, frequent pornography use, and low relationship intimacy significantly increased the odds of reporting frequent masturbation among coupled men with decreased sexual desire.”

“Among men [with decreased sexual desire] who used pornography at least once a week [in 2011], 26.1% reported that they were unable to control their pornography use. In addition, 26.7% of men reported that their use of pornography negatively affected their partnered sex and 21.1% claimed to have attempted to stop using pornography.”

Hypersexual” behavior represents a perceived inability to control one’s sexual behavior. To investigate hypersexual behavior, an international sample of 510 self-identified heterosexual, bisexual, and homosexual men and women completed an anonymous online self-report questionnaire battery.

Thus, the data indicated that hypersexual behavior is more common for males, and those who report being younger in age, more easily sexually excited, more sexually inhibited due to the threat of performance failure, less sexually inhibited due to the threat of performance consequences, and more impulsive, anxious, and depressed

Mental health specialists should take in consideration the possible effects of pornography consumption on men sexual behaviors, men sexual difficulties and other attitudes related to sexuality. In the long term pornography seems to create sexual dysfunctions, especially the individual’s inability to reach an orgasm with his partner. Someone who spends most of his sexual life masturbating while watching porn engages his brain in rewiring its natural sexual sets (Doidge, 2007) so that it will soon need visual stimulation to achieve an orgasm.

Many different symptoms of porn consumption, such as the need to involve a partner in watching porn, the difficulty in reaching orgasm, the need for porn images in order to ejaculate turn into sexual problems. These sexual behaviors may go on for months or years and it may be mentally and bodily associated with the erectile dysfunction, although it is not an organic dysfunction. Because of this confusion, which generates embarrassment, shame and denial, lots of men refuse to encounter a specialist

Pornography offers a very simple alternative to obtain pleasure without implying other factors that were involved in human’s sexuality along the history of mankind. The brain develops an alternative path for sexuality which excludes “the other real person” from the equation. Furthermore, pornography consumption in a long term makes men more prone to difficulties in obtaining an erection in a presence of their partners.

Young men who prefer pornography to real-world sexual encounters might find themselves caught in a trap, unable to perform sexually with other people when the opportunity presents itself, a new study reports. Porn-addicted men are more likely to suffer from erectile dysfunction and are less likely to be satisfied with sexual intercourse, according to survey findings presented Friday at the American Urological Association’s annual meeting, in Boston.

“The rates of organic causes of erectile dysfunction in this age cohort are extremely low, so the increase in erectile dysfunction that we have seen over time for this group needs to be explained,” Christman said. “We believe that pornography use may be one piece to that puzzle”.

Finally, we found that frequency of pornography consumption was also directly related to a relative preference for pornographic rather than partnered sexual excitement. Participants in the present study primarily consumed pornography for masturbation. Thus, this finding could be indicative of a masturbatory conditioning effect (Cline, 1994; Malamuth, 1981; Wright, 2011). The more frequently pornography is used as an arousal tool for masturbation, the more an individual may become conditioned to pornographic as opposed to other sources of sexual arousal.

Among participants who responded to the open-ended question (n=718), problematic usage was self-identified by 88 respondents. Male participants who reported problematic usage of pornography highlighted effects in three areas: on sexual function, arousal and relationships. Responses included “I think it has been a negative influence in many ways but at the same time I can’t stop using it” (Male, Aged 18–19). Some female participants also reported problematic usage, with many of these reporting negative feelings like guilt and shame, impact on sexual desire and compulsions relating to their use of pornography. For example as one female participant suggested; “It makes me feel guilty, and I’m trying to stop. I don’t like how I feel that I need it to get myself going, it’s not healthy.” (Female, Aged 18–19)

EXCERPT: The most common phrase is “erectile dysfunction” – which is mentioned more than three times as often as any other phrase – followed by “internet porn,” “performance anxiety,” and “watching porn.” Clearly, porn is a frequently discussed subject: “I have been viewing internet pornography frequently (4 to 5 times a week) for the past 6 years,” one man writes. “I am in my mid-20s and have had a problem getting and maintaining an erection with sexual partners since my late teens when I first started looking at internet porn.”

[…] In the last 20 years research confirms a tremendous rise in male sexual problems (ED, delayed ejaculation and low sexual desire). ED rates in men under forty have skyrocketed 1,000% or more, while low libido rates have jumped 400%. Several recent studies have found relationships between porn use in young men and ED, anorgamsia, low sexual desire, delayed ejaculation, and lower brain activation to sexual images. In addition, this page contains articles and videos by about 65 experts (urology professors, urologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, sexologists, MDs) who acknowledge and have successfully treated porn-induced ED and porn-induced loss of sexual desire. It must be noted that over 20 neuroscience-based studies on porn users offer support for the concept of porn addiction. […]

[…] Reality check. All studies assessing young male sexuality since 2010 report historic levels of sexual dysfunctions, and startling rates of a new scourge: low libido. All documented in this article. […]